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Depends what you consider the actual duty of a politician is. Is it to get elected, or to be a good statesman? The car salesman tack is unavoidable in modern politics and is thus pretty much necessary if you even want a shot. But is it really a relevant skill in BEING a politician, or does it offer no aid beyond the election?

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Originally Posted by Vallen Chaos Valiant

The duty of a used car salesman is to gain maximum profit for himself at any cost to the detriment of everyone else. This is the best way to get elected and then become massively rich by emptying the coffers. But that isn't going to help the country.

The goal of elections is to find the best man for the job. The skills of a used car salesman is used in this case to break the system; the man is the worst person for the job, but he tricks the population into getting him elected anyway. Thus democracy is destroyed.

You're both right off course. Ideally election should find the best man for the job. Yet the requirement to be good at running in elections (and polls) disqualifies so many people who would be infinitely more suited for the job of running a country.

The point I'm trying to make is that con men (the ones that run at least) don't cheat the system, instead the system (mediacracy?) increasingly favours con men to win. Playing the devils advocate: if the goal of elections is to find good statesmen why does it only test them on their skills as crooks?

Obviously elected. Doesn't mean we have to take such a bleak view of the world that the broken mechanism determines the actual duty. I still prefer to be somewhat idealistic, if willing to admit the system doesn't work - especially in the modern age of television and mass media.

President Obama has called people who work on Wall Street “fat-cat bankers,” and his reelection campaign has sought to harness public frustration with Wall Street. Financial executives retort that the president’s pursuit of financial regulations is punitive and that new rules may be “holding us back.”
But both sides face an inconvenient fact: During Obama’s tenure, Wall Street has roared back, even as the broader economy has struggled.
The largest banks are larger than they were when Obama took office and are nearing the level of profits they were making before the depths of the financial crisis in 2008, according to government data.
Wall Street firms — independent companies and the securities-trading arms of banks — are doing even better. They earned more in the first 21 / 2 years of the Obama administration than they did during the eight years of the George W. Bush administration, industry data show.

President Obama has called people who work on Wall Street “fat-cat bankers,” and his reelection campaign has sought to harness public frustration with Wall Street. Financial executives retort that the president’s pursuit of financial regulations is punitive and that new rules may be “holding us back.”
But both sides face an inconvenient fact: During Obama’s tenure, Wall Street has roared back, even as the broader economy has struggled.
The largest banks are larger than they were when Obama took office and are nearing the level of profits they were making before the depths of the financial crisis in 2008, according to government data.
Wall Street firms — independent companies and the securities-trading arms of banks — are doing even better. They earned more in the first 21 / 2 years of the Obama administration than they did during the eight years of the George W. Bush administration, industry data show.

The "system" that they've rigged is the Constitution itself. The "majority wins" voting system discourages third parties and vote splitting. To change the system would require much more than simply new ideas, it would require an Amendment to switch to voting system that takes into account what voters actually want. To pass the Amendment would require destroying both parties first, since they would block anything to reduce their power.

Discouraged, but not banned. There are several parties in US politics, and everyone once in a while a third party come out that makes waves, or even take over from an existing party (Remember the Whigs or the Democratic-Republicans?). But today it seems more that a political party will rather shift itself over to something else over a period of time rather than change its name. As I think Vexx complained about, the Republican Party is not the Republican Party he grew up with. Neither is the Democratic Part for that matter. Something changed fundimentally in both parties from the 1960s to the 1980s. Even their voting blocks almost completely shifted around. The South use to be Democrats territory and now it is Republicans territory. Something changed and the two parties are not the same parties anymore.

However, vote splitting will typically result in loss. Hence, it is a no-go.

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Neither is the Democratic Part for that matter. Something changed fundimentally in both parties from the 1960s to the 1980s. Even their voting blocks almost completely shifted around. The South use to be Democrats territory and now it is Republicans territory. Something changed and the two parties are not the same parties anymore.

Discouraged, but not banned. There are several parties in US politics, and everyone once in a while a third party come out that makes waves, or even take over from an existing party (Remember the Whigs or the Democratic-Republicans?). But today it seems more that a political party will rather shift itself over to something else over a period of time rather than change its name. As I think Vexx complained about, the Republican Party is not the Republican Party he grew up with. Neither is the Democratic Part for that matter. Something changed fundimentally in both parties from the 1960s to the 1980s. Even their voting blocks almost completely shifted around. The South use to be Democrats territory and now it is Republicans territory. Something changed and the two parties are not the same parties anymore.

There's a reason for that and Professor Carroll Quigley was spot on when he wrote about it in his book:

"The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can 'throw the rascals out' at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy. Then it should be possible to replace it, every four years if necessary, by the other party, which will be none of these things but will still pursue, with new vigor, approximately the same basic policies."-Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, Chapter 20, page 1247/1248.

As I've said numerous times before, there was no military industrial complex prior to the 1950s.
After they came into being, both parties changed into corporate-socialist/corporatist shills.

As I've said numerous times before, there was no military industrial complex prior to the 1950s.
After they came into being, both parties changed into corporate-socialist/corporatist shills.

Agreed that to a large extent you're choosing *which* corporations will get a better ride and screw you more as a taxpayer when you vote Dem or GOP.
Both the Progressive/Occupy surge on one side and some parts of the Tea Party from the other (minus astroturfs and hijacks) - they are bottom level responses to both parties dropping the pretense it was anything else.

For a while one could point clearly to the GOP as the lesser of two evils for common folk. But now if you look at the corporate ownership, the tentacles clearly have a grip on both sides of the aisle - making Kang and Kodos not so funny now.